


don't make me miss you (just let me kiss you)

by gaysandcrime



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Basically, Donna forgets, Donna is Donna, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing, Lots and lots of emotional pain, Pining, Saving the world is easier than saving ourselves, The Author Regrets Nothing, The Doctor on His Own, Time Travel, True Love's Kiss, i dont really know where im going with this, it sorta kinda maybe breaks the curse, sorrynotsorry, sort of confusing timeline, stars and space and stuff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-11-18
Updated: 2016-11-18
Packaged: 2018-08-31 16:08:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8585053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaysandcrime/pseuds/gaysandcrime
Summary: Donna Noble was once a girl who spent her nights gazing at the sky, constellations of freckles on her skin. The Doctor was once a man who recklessly went from moment to moment, meeting new people and righting wrongs. Now, there is only a woman who cannot remember and a man who feels the years finally catching up to him. 
(a tale of time travel, confusing timelines, adventure and love.)





	1. the lonely, the broken and the fallen

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gaylock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaylock/gifts).



> Feels far from home, close to the vale  
> Goodbye mother's fairy-tale  
> Never After will suffice when star-crossed lovers take their life

Chapter 1: the lonely, the broken and the fallen

 

It wasn't supposed to happen this way. He was supposed to catch a glimpse and then leave, only staying long enough to ensure her safety, her happiness. It was against all the rules he'd set for himself, all the rules of the universe and yet here he was.

Many years and many faces older and still, nothing had changed. She would be standing in a line somewhere, looking so completely ordinary (but she wasn't, she was brilliant, she was _magic_ ), and his heart would rip out of his chest each time she smiled. It didn't matter that she never saw him, because that was part of his punishment. And it didn't matter that she would never hear him say those three words, would never know- because that was part of his punishment, too.

Sometimes he would visit The Time Before It All, when she was untainted by his presence. This always made him feel guilty and shameful; he was taking her moments of freedom and tainting them anyways, it didn't matter that she had no idea who he was or what he meant because _he_ knew, he would always know. Those times were the hardest to stay hidden, because what harm could it do, to just say hello? To tell her that she was lovely? To tell her he missed her? But in the end he would always leave in silence, knowing that it was his punishment to stay a silent bystander in the life of the only person who mattered.

Other times he visited the Time In Between, that year of wonder and adventure, where she had searched for him in every way she could. And still he stayed silent, and watched as she made her own blazing path through the world, a star on earth. And maybe this time was the easiest for him, because she knew. She knew about him, she cared and she wanted to be special, and he could watch her be brilliant like he would always remember. He could pretend that it was the both of them running about, saving the world. He could follow her and pretend, just for a minute, that everything was fine.

And then there was the Time After, where he would sit in a quiet corner of a shop, or at an empty table in a cafe and he would watch her be ordinary. And perhaps it was these times that reminded him that he had made the right choice all those years ago. Because sitting there, he could see her being ordinary, and how brilliant she was at it, just like everything else. It was moments like that where he felt almost happy, because even though it wasn't a special life, she was still the most brilliant, the most important, the most special thing that he had ever known. Here like this, she could outshine everyone and still be safe. It made him almost happy, because here like this, being ordinary and brilliant all at the same time, she could finally be happy as he had never made her.

* * *

 

There was only one time he decided to break all the rules so he could see her like he remembered her to be. He sat and thought and moped and remembered, and thought some more, until he could no longer think at all. His mind was foggy and his heart was screaming and the only thing he could remember was her name. He felt drunk on her memory, like she was the only thing that existed, that had ever existed. He was exhausted with the thought of her, and later that is what he would blame his foolish decision on.

So despite a little voice in the back of his head telling him how he was breaking every rule in the universe, he punched in some numbers and wrote in her name. His hands trace her name like it was the most precious treasure in all of the worlds, even as his head exploded with the thought of seeing her - _truly seeing her_ \- again.

He landed in the middle of chaos and invited himself in, as if he did this every day, as if it was nothing to break the most important rules of time and space. He watched himself at first, much younger and much more naive than he could remember being, and he couldn't help but to mourn for that young soul who would lose so much. He watched himself being brilliant, wrapped in a long coat and a suit, wearing those silly shoes Rose had always favoured. His tie was loose and his hair a mess, but it didn't matter because there she was, laughing at him with her brilliant eyes as they both ran through danger like it was nothing. He watched himself greedily, thinking about all the time he'd wasted back then, all the opportunities to say what he desperately wished to say.

And then he was watching her, her hair and her smile and her exaggerated hand movements all coming together to form the most perfect being he had ever seen. She was laughing and talking and running alongside his younger self, and suddenly she was saying his name in that loud, bossy voice he missed so much. He couldn't help himself then, and the tear slid down his cheek before he could do anything about it. He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to memorise everything about her. When he opened his eyes again they were disappearing into a blue telephone box, and he knew that this was the last time he would be able to see them, see her, like this. So he looked away as the door was closing and made himself walk in the opposite direction. He could feel his own eyes staring at his retreating back, but refused the temptation to turn around and catch his younger selfs gaze.

Oh, how he wished more than anything to warn him, to tell him what would happen and help himself find a way to stop it! But he knew that he could not, not if he wanted to keep her safe, and so he continued on to his own blue phone booth and didn't look back. 


	2. we can't all be made of starlight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Star light  
> Star bright  
> First star I see tonight  
> Wish I may and wish I might  
> Have this wish I wish tonight

Sometimes, Donna dreamed about the stars. When she was a little girl, her grandfather would sneak her outside to the yard, a thermos of cocoa in his hands, and tell her stories about the planets and the beings up there in the sky. He would let her sit in front of the telescope, looking at all of the galaxies and planets, suns and moons she could see. She could name many of the stars, and trace the constellations with a finger, but her favourite thing to do was sit there silently, listening to her grandad's tales, and look at Mars.

When her mother caught her trying to go outside at night by herself, she would be sent back to her room with shouting and anger. And though she would pout for a bit, Donna would always end up sitting at her window, looking up to the sky. Her mother would find her curled up there every morning, a smile on her sleeping face. And Sylvia would huff loudly, and tell her that Gramp's stories were just that- stories. But Donna, with her flaming red braids and her pale, freckled skin would just look up at the sky and ignore her every time. Because deep inside of her, in some part of her soul, she knew better.

* * *

 

When Donna was fourteen, she was bullied endlessly at school by all the other girls her age. With her ginger hair and her 'complete and utterly useless stupidity', they told her that they didn't want anything to do with her. It took weeks of coaxing from her grandfather before she spoke of the problem- and that was the first time he told her how she was meant for the stars.

"Donna," he said, "don't listen to them. You were meant for something so much bigger than any of them- why, they're just regular old idiots. You are made of something special."

"You really think so, Gramp's?"

"Aye, Donna. I really think so."

* * *

 

When Donna was seventeen she went on her first date. He was her friend's brother, and she was endlessly excited. Sylvia watched disapprovingly as they left and even more disapprovingly as they returned, Donna with tears streaming down her face as she ran to the back yard and into her grandfather's arms.

"He made fun of m-my freckles, Gramp's! H-h-he said they were ugly!"

Her grandfather held her and rocked her and let her cry herself out. "That's because he doesn't know that they're a star chart for some wonderful galaxy far away." That night they watched the stars together, like they used to do all those years ago, and somehow it seemed a little more magical when the starlight fell on her pale, freckled skin.

* * *

 

Donna was twenty-five and newly single when she stopped seeing the magic in the stars. She stood inside her home next to her mother, and listened to her grandfather talk about comets and planets and space. He spoke at length about the aliens he knew were out there, and the magical worlds no one could see. He looked at her and frowned.

"What's wrong, Donna?"

She turned away and closed her eyes. "They're just stories, Gramp's."

That was the day she stopped believing in herself, and started believing her mother's words instead. Because how could she possibly be brilliant, how could she possibly be special? The stars were just stars, and she was just ordinary, and that's just how it was.

If Mars looked a little duller that night, nobody noticed.

* * *

 

Sometimes, when she was out for her lunch break during work, she would catch sight of a man in the corner of the cafe. He was never looking at her, but somehow she felt as if she was the only thing he could see. His eyes were dark and haunted, filled with more pain than she could handle, and so she always turned away.

His gaze would seem to follow her as she left, and she couldn't help but feel a little more like a star after he was gone.

* * *

 

On the day of her wedding, Donna found herself swept away into the sky. She had finally met the man who she had searched so long for as a child, and he was the most vibrant and brilliant thing she had ever seen. And they solved a mystery and saved lives and turned the world upside down together, and it was wonderful, even if it was just for a day.

But his eyes- his eyes were a familiar weight on her back as she left, and she couldn't help but think about the stranger from the cafe.

* * *

 

Sometimes, in the year that followed, she would catch sight of a man with dark, pain filled eyes, and be reminded of two different strangers who seemed to affect her so greatly.

* * *

 

When she met the martian ( _not_ from Mars, apparently) again, she felt a familiar excitement rise up, and Mars shone a little brighter. She knew then that she had to follow him, no matter what he did or where he went; he was like Mars, that beautiful, dark, fiery planet, drawing her in like a moth to a flame. And so she did, because he made her feel important even though she was anything but, and because his eyes reminded her of a stranger in a cafe who made her feel like she meant something.

* * *

 

One day her Spaceman asked her an incredible question, and her world was twisted on its head.

"Donna, do you by any chance know a gentleman in a dark jacket with tails? Sort of feathery blondish greyish hair?"

She stood very still and very quiet. "What?"

"He's older, got wrinkles and everything- but it's his eyes that really caught my attention."

She whirled around. "His eyes." She stared at him for a moment. "Dark and sad and filled with secrets that nobody knows?"

He nodded.

"I don't know him, but I- I've seen him, yes. Why?"

He fiddled with the console and shrugged. "Oh, no reason, really. Just caught him looking and his expression was- well, he looked like he knew you." He shrugged again.

Donna turned away and glanced outside the window at the Earth far below. "His eyes are always filled with accusation and longing, like I'd done him some terrible wrong."

"Well, you haven't, have you?"

Donna frowned at the stars outside. I don't know, she thought. I don't know. She turned back to look at him. In the light of the tardis, his eyes no longer bore any resemblance to the stranger's, and she smiled. "No, I have not."

* * *

 

Strangers are just friends you haven't met yet. That was something her grandad loved to say, and standing in front of the most brilliant man she had ever known, she couldn't help but agree. This man, who wasn't a man at all, made her feel special and wonderful and important. He had changed her into someone who mattered, and there was nothing in all of the universes she could possibly do in return. She wanted to tell him how much she loved him, wanted to kiss him until the tears went away and everything perfect again.

"I was supposed to be with you forever," she said instead, and somehow she knew he understood.

"I know. I won't lose you, too." He left his own declaration unspoken, but Donna heard it anyways. She looked into his eyes and saw a vision of the man from the cafe, who's eyes always made her feel so alone. And now with her Spaceman, her Doctor, she could see that same darkness and pain inside his eyes and she knew.

I know who you are, she thought to that man from the cafe desperately. I know who you are, I know what you did and I love you anyways.

She finally recognised the look in his eyes, after all this time. It was loss.

I will find you, her mind whispered as she fell into darkness. I swear on the stars, I will find you.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AN: next chapter is when the plot finally picks up, and the action and adventure can pick up the pace. Sorry if the timeline is a little bit confusing, but thats time-travel for you *shrugs*. The Doctor isn't going to follow a strict linear line of progression, especially when "travel" means having to deviate from linear in the first place. Honestly, this is more of a...well, a big ball of wibbly wobbly timey wimey stuff, and if you can't figure it out on your own, then sorry but you're SOL. Anywho, stay tuned for angst and adventure next chapter:) Forgetful!Donna meets the Doctor, and goes alien hunting and world saving with him. Woohoo

**Author's Note:**

> AN: this was obviously the Doctor's pov. Just wanted to clear up a few things; Donna has already been made to forget, and this story talks about how hard it is for the Doctor to let her go. He continually visits her at various times, whether its before his younger self meets her, in that year between where Donna was searching for him, or after she has been made to forget. He's obviously much older than the Tenth, probably a couple of regenerations after Capaldi (Twelve).


End file.
